Islip renews ICE rifle range contract after narrow vote

Islip kept U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on the firing line at its town rifle range, approving a contract renewal by a 4-1 vote that extends the deal through June 30, 2028, with an option for three more years. The decision, taken Tuesday at the Islip Town Board, preserved ICE access to the range at 200 Freeman Avenue and guaranteed that the fight over the facility will keep returning to Town Hall.

The agreement has been in place for about 20 years and gives multiple agencies access to the range, but ICE has become the flash point. Residents and activists have packed public meetings for months, arguing that any continued training support for the agency crosses a line in a town with a large Latino population and families who say they already feel the effects of immigration enforcement.

Councilman Jorge Guadron cast the lone dissenting vote. He argued that the language should be tighter and limit ICE to training only, but he still said the revised version did not go far enough for residents who want the arrangement ended entirely. The rest of the board lined up behind renewal, despite the pressure that had built since the contract was set to expire June 30, 2026.

The controversy has been building since at least last summer. In August 2025, Guadron tried to suspend ICE access altogether, but the motion to suspend the rules failed unanimously and the meeting descended into shouts from the audience. A month earlier, the Town of Islip had defended the arrangement in a public statement, saying it had allowed the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to use the gun range for training since the early 2000s and arguing that the partnership helps ensure safe firearms use and proper training.

The pressure only grew as the deadline approached. CBS News New York reported that ICE agents used the range 33 times in 2024 and 11 times so far in 2025, while Greater Long Island reported that Homeland Security had used the range since 2008 under authorization through June 30, 2026. In April, residents again filled a town meeting to urge officials to reject renewal, and activists including Ahmad Perez of Islip Forward kept pressing the board to end what they see as town support for an agency they believe has fueled fear across Suffolk County.

For Islip, the vote did not settle the issue so much as extend it. The town has kept a longstanding public facility open to ICE and other agencies, but the political cost is now just as fixed as the contract itself.